Royal British Legion offering D-Day veterans tours to Normandy to pay their respects

Neil Shefferd

The Royal British Legion’s travel arm is offering D-Day veterans free-of-charge tours to Normandy, but as the organisation has no database of D-Day veterans, it needs your help to spread the word.

The mission to make every surviving D-Day veteran aware of this chance is being led by Nichola Rowlands, the head of travel at Remembrance Travel.

She said: “The Treasury is enabling a series of free-of-charge tours for D-Day veterans to return to Normandy and pay their respects to their fallen comrades. “The tours are being funded by the Treasury from LIBOR fines, and will enable a D-Day veteran to return with a family member and carer on a six-night tour.

“The 2017 tours will take place in March, April, May and September and will give Normandy veterans - now mostly in their 90s - the chance to revisit the Normandy beaches, cemeteries and memorials.

“The tours will be accompanied by a medic and a guide from the Royal British Legion.

“The tours will depart from London and will include Eurotunnel from Dover to Calais, accommodation, visits to Pegasus Bridge, Juno, Sword, Gold beaches, Arromanches, and war memorials, plus visits to personally specified cemeteries too.

“Sadly, there is no database of D-Day veterans so we’re calling on the goodwill of the public to spread the word.”